1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to: an image processing system with a plurality of image processing servers and an image forming apparatus such as a multifunctional digital machine referred to as MFP, being connected to each other via a network; an image processing server to be employed in the image processing system; and an image forming apparatus also to be employed in the image processing system.
2. Description of the Related Art
The following description sets forth the inventor's knowledge of related art and problems therein and should not be construed as an admission of knowledge in the prior art.
As well as an image forming apparatus such as a MFP, performing by itself all image processing operations on image data received as mentioned above, there is an image processing system making a plurality of external image processing servers cooperatively perform different image processing operations in an orderly manner, which has been heretofore suggested (for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publications No. 2004-289500 and No. 2006-195893).
In such an image processing system making a plurality of image processing servers cooperatively perform different image processing operations, an image forming apparatus whose resources are too limited to perform all image processing operations does not need to have a complex configuration such as having the ability of performing all image processing operations, which is very advantageous.
Recently, there is an image processing system just like SaaS (Software as a Service), providing Web services to allow users to select preferred image processing operations of various suppliers to obtain target images.
Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2004-289500 discloses a method for an image processing apparatus, including: generating document data; and instructing a plurality of external servers to cooperatively perform specific operations exceeding the ability of the image processing apparatus, on the document data.
Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2006-195893 discloses a method of performing a scanning operation while calculating charges for all the services provided by a job flow service apparatus, a multifunctional machine, an image processing apparatus, a converter, and a file administration apparatus, in this order.
In such an image processing system as mentioned above, there may be multiple image processing servers performing similar image processing services and there may be other multiple image processing servers each being in charge of one of the image processing services. In this case, there are considered to be a lot of combinations of image processing servers, which can be composed by users. However, users would not be always able to receive services with very good quality, depending on the combination.
When placing an order of OCR and translation services for example, a cost-sensitive user would compose a combination of image processing servers by selecting image processing servers offering their services for the lowest charges. Thus the OCR server selected by this user would not be always very good in terms of the quality of service. And translation servers possibly can have a problem of compatibility with the OCR servers because of their different characteristics. Therefore, the user would not be always able to receive OCR and translation services in total, with very good quality.
Compatibility between servers is substantially a factor which never affects the quality of services regardless of the data to be processed by the services. However, composing a combination of servers possibly causes them perform unnecessary operations. In recent years, from the perspective of security control, more people have come to use a character encoding service to encode characters on a hard copy document, resulting in an increasing demand for an image processing system which offers services with very good quality.
The description herein of advantages and disadvantages of various features, embodiments, methods, and apparatus disclosed in other publications is in no way intended to limit the present invention. Indeed, certain features of the invention may be capable of overcoming certain disadvantages, while still retaining some or all of the features, embodiments, methods, and apparatus disclosed therein.